On 24 June 2016 HollandBIO organised their Dutch Life Sciences SME Event which was a big success. The great line-up of biotech entrepreneurs attracted a record number of participants. The attractive programme included the launch of the sector vision Life Sciences 2030, presentations of Allard Kaptein (Acerta Pharma) and Onno van de Stolpe (Galapagos), four different workshops, many expert meetings, and networking opportunities during the barbeque.

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The afternoon started with the launch of HollandBIO’s sector vision Life Sciences 2030 which was handed to David Pappie, Director Top Sectors and Industry Policy at the Ministry of Economic Affairs (see separate article). Allard Kaptein shed light on the evolution of Acerta Pharma. From its origin at Organon, the spin-out and defining team up with a US company, the combined technologies leading to unparalleled clinical data and finally, the company’s major deal with AstraZeneca. A great success story of inspiration and teamwork. Finally, Onno van de Stolpe showed that entrepreneurship in the life sciences indeed requires dedication. Van de Stolpe told about the exciting, 18 year-long journey of Galapos and how he managed to build the strong, integrated biotech company it is today. His advice to the many young entrepreneurs present: “Never give up, you’ll get there.”

With two rounds of parallel workshops and the opportunity to consult an expert of choice, the afternoon offered something for everyone. Appealing workshop themes like ‘Valley of death survival guide’, ‘Strategies for Growth’, ‘How to ru(i)n your business’ and ‘Success is a yellow Ferrari’ made it hard to choose. Some interesting lesson learned: choose your shareholders wisely, for example by performing the beer test: ‘if you cannot drink a beer with someone, don’t do business together’.

The barbeque offered plenty of opportunity to talk further and to share insights and personal experiences. Both HollandBIO and Top Sector LSH are looking forward to next year’s edition.

The perfect cut to cure cancer

On November 24th at the Dutch Life Sciences Conference, Chretien Herben, director LifeSciences@Work Accelerator announced RadiQual Surgery as winning team of the 16th edition of the Venture Challenge. RadiQual Surgery has developed a worldwide unique product called Logi-Knife that enables surgeons to make use of high quality diagnostic imaging data for real-time 3D surgical navigation during their surgical procedures. Using Logi-Knife, surgeons are able to perform the perfect cut to cure cancer.

According to the Venture Challenge Jury the technogical innovation of RadiQual Surgery addresses the high medical need to optimize the success of tumor operations. Radical Surgery presents a missing link in today’s cancer surgery. The fact that several clinical trials are already running and 20 surgeons positively used the new system with 50 patients ultimately lead to the jury’s winner decision. The RadiQual Surgery Logi-Knife has been developed at the Netherlands Cancer Institute – Antoni van Leeuwenhoek by surgeons for surgeons, resulting in an intuitive and clinically relevant product. Additional sponsoring was provided by Alpe d’HuZes/Dutch Cancer Society (KWF) and Vriendenloterij.